this, is the effect i'm trying to achieve, however its not really extending the footer, which is how i'd like to accomplish it. +1
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JaiMar 17 '12 at 14:34

If you want your footer to have a dynamic height, this is the way to do it. if it is a fixed height I would use one of the answers above OR use javascript to sniff out ready events and resize events to calc the body height! Hope this helps!
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TimWickstrom.comMar 19 '12 at 16:45

I had the same problem and found this to work - so long as the footer is out on its own, i.e. not within a container div or anything.

Basically, I needed my content to be fixed width and centred on a white background with a horizontally repeating background image in the body tag extending the full width of the browser window, providing a nice band beneath the header. I wanted the footer to be in a dark colour and extend to the bottom of the page regardless of the height of the content and browser window size.